Cold Rain Today – Snow Thursday?

Cold Rain Today – Snow Thursday?

Great news this morning. All the precipitation is in the form of rain as temperatures remain above freezing. The winter weather advisories until 6am this morning could be dropped with the “milder” temperatures.

Tomorrow gets interesting as an upper level disturbance heads our way. Depending on the track and strength of the disturbance will depend on how much snow we get in the Tennessee Valley. The best chance of accumulating snow is across the higher terrain of DeKalb County (Lookout Mountain) and the northern Cumberland Plateau. Any accumulations at this time will be minor, but upper level systems are fickle. They are known to drop a couple of inches of snow in a short period of time.

Here is the GFS model valid around lunch time on Thursday.

The upper level left shows a disturbance in the upper atmosphere moving through. The upper right shows the thickness or temperature in the middle layers of the atmosphere. The closed 540 red line can SOMETIMES indicate temperatures cold enough to produce snow. That line is across all of the central and north Alabama. The lower left shows the moisture in the air. Alabama has 70%-90% relative humidity in the area at this time. The lower right show precipitation ending at this time. Central and east Alabama has .10″ to .50″ liquid equivalent. That is in the form of rain and snow. With that being said, it’s something to monitor.

Here is the percentage of having an inch of snow on the ground by Friday morning. We are around 10%-30%.